Once again we are gong to bomb Syria in response to Assad's use of chemical weapons on his own people. Trump announces that it will be an open-ended commitment. A new war? To what end? Last year, in April, we proved that deterrence does not work. We bombed cornfields beside an airstrip, as a warning. No result. They did it again last Saturday, April 7th.

Clearly, deterrence doesn't work. The military realizes this. So, this can only be punitive...and Trump says it's "open-ended". Let's think about this: WE ARE GOING TO WAR, POSSIBLY FOR THE NEXT 15-YEARS, NO DOUBT COMMITTING ANOTHER $17-TRILLION, TO PUNISH BAD GUYS, WHO WON'T BE PUNISHED. Does that make sense? Russians warn of potential for retaliation; Syria positions its assets close to Russians.

No deterrence. No punishment. What can this be all about? Perhaps EGO's? Like masturbation...it just feels good!

BTW, it's clearly illegal. It's in clear violation of Art. I of the US Constitution. More impeachment material??

eddie wrote:I’ve read through this thread and would like to just ask that we all be kind to each other as we have no idea what someone else is going through.

Thank you beautiful people.

Hear, hear! Maybe if we could all remember there's a real human being behind each user name, with our own stories and struggles and charms and flaws, we'd keep from treating each other quite so horribly.

_________________“As man advances in civilization, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races.”

eddie wrote:I’ve read through this thread and would like to just ask that we all be kind to each other as we have no idea what someone else is going through.

Thank you beautiful people.

Hear, hear! Maybe if we could all remember there's a real human being behind each user name, with our own stories and struggles and charms and flaws, we'd keep from treating each other quite so horribly.

Please explain who you think is doing all this nasty posting you are referring to...?

_________________“Truth is ever to be found in the simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.” — Isaac Newton

'The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.' — George Orwell

nicko wrote:Because it's only us three that wont sit back and let shit happen !

So is Russia fixing the Shit the USA made happen in the middle east?

and wont sit back and let shit happen like ????? I mean it's not like anyone stopped Assad in the Decades Before the USA turned Neighbouring Iraq into a terrorist hell hole.

So the US is responsible for Saudi and Iran fighting a proxy war. That has gone unabated since the beginnings of Islam, with Shia and Sunni now?

Really?

The insurgents who carried out mass terrorism, are not responsible apparantly to the warped view of the regressive left. Apparantly the US is responsible for the 1400 conflict between Shia and Sunni groups? Even though the US did not exist at the time.

It may have escaped your attention, but US Presidents change every 4 years.It may have also escaped your attention, but Trump is about the first President to stand up to Putin, who has protected Assad for decades

As not long after the attack, the rebels negotiated with Russia to leave and withddraw...'

I have seen reports that there had already been weeks of negotiations with the terrorists/white-helmets (before the alleged chemical attack) about them offering to surrender (the area, all their heavy/medium weapons, equipment etc) if allowed safe passage bus evacuation to elsewhere... AND that this had also already been agreed before the alleged chemical attack... AND that some had already started leaving before the alleged chemical attack too...!!!

If this is the case... it is completely beyond belief that govt troops would carry out any such action!!!

It is highly doubtful that they even have any chemical weapons... because the stuff the govt forces did have, was all removed and destroyed a couple of years ago by the USA and OPCW...!

However... there was never any kind of clearout of the stuff the terrorists had got hold of...!

My opinion on the video... not a chemical attack by govt forces at all... more likely that if the vid is real (time/date/location + people shown not acting etc), then they may have been near to somewhere that the retreating terrorists had been using as a command/control/storage centre etc and the terrorists had blown it up themselves rather than leave it all there for govt forces to get hold of... and those in vid suffering effects of dust&smoke from that...!?

Seems much more likely that surrendering/retreating terrorists were blowing up their network of command-posts/tunnels/hide-outs/weapons/ammo/equipment etc, and of course they would want to destroy any computer/communication equipment and paperwork/plans etc...!!!

_________________“Truth is ever to be found in the simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.” — Isaac Newton

'The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.' — George Orwell

The UN security detail set out to perform reconnaissance in Douma ahead of the arrival of the actual inspectors, who were scheduled to go in on Wednesday.

As OPCW chief Ahmet Uzumcu explained in a statement, the two suspected attack sites are under the control of the Russian military police as part of an agreement with the rebels to keep out the Syrian military.

When the security team arrived at the first site, a large crowd gathered and the UN decided to withdraw.

At the second site, "the team came under small arms fire and an explosive was detonated," said Mr Uzumcu.

US state department spokeswoman Heather Nauert warned on Tuesday that the delays in getting the OPCW experts into Douma to gather soil samples and other information would "further degrade" any evidence on the ground.

France's foreign ministry said it was "very likely that proof and essential elements" were "disappearing from this site".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-43792120

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr, reporting from neighbouring Lebanon's capital Beirut, said the OPCW statement did not lay blame on anyone for the incident but added that both Syria and its main ally Russia "have been accused by Western powers of hampering the work" of the watchdog.

"What we understand is that Douma is under the control of the Russian military and the Syrian government. Both of them claimed just a few days ago that the area had been 'fully liberated from terrorists'," she said.

Syrian and Russian forces gained control over Douma on Saturday when rebels withdrew from the town, hours after the end of the Western countries' attacks.

On Tuesday, SANA falsely reported that the OPCW's fact-finding team, which arrived in Damascus on Saturday, entered Douma.

Ishak Majali, a former OPCW inspector, said it is unlikely the inspectors will find evidence at the site after such delay.

"It has been a lot of time since the attack took place - we are talking about 11 days," he told Al Jazeera.

"So, if you are in control of a site with chemicals for such a long time, it's very easy actually to tamper with the place and to change the facts on the ground," he added.

"You can actually do what we call it in the military business as the decontamination process, which is to remove all the evidence on the ground by using other chemicals to neutralise the chemicals on the ground. Also, you can tamper with the munition itself ... to prepare some witnesses or to prepare some medical reports."

If ever you wanted to see how badly the Russians use disinformation and it backfires in your face, then see thia:

Senior figures from the global chemical weapons watchdog have flatly rejected Russian claims that the watchdog’s laboratories had found a western military chemical agent in the poison that incapacitated the Russian double agent Sergei Skripal.

In a weekend claim widely picked up on social media, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said that a Swiss laboratory used by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons had discovered traces in the sample of the nerve agent BZ and its precursors. The nerve agent is possessed by Nato countries, but not Russia.

The Russian embassy in London said it was “highly likely” that BZ had therefore been used in Salisbury, adding that the OPCW and the British had questions to answer.

But at a meeting of the OPCW executive in The Hague, the Russian claim was refuted by OPCW officials, who said explained that BZ had been used in the control sample, not the sample itself. It is also a breach of OPCW procedures to identify a laboratory involved in a test.

Academics at some of the UK’s top universities pushing pro-Assad propaganda have been accused by parts of the Syrian community of “peddling conspiracy theories” and “whitewashing” war crimes.

The Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media (WG) has been set up by a number of left-wing professors to examine the “role of both media and propaganda” and provide “reliable, informed and timely analysis for journalists, publics and policymakers”.

Although in its infancy, the group’s published material as well as public posts by its members have already drawn accusations of circulating Islamophobic tropes and “wilfully ignoring the depravity of the regime”.

Two of the academics in particular, Professor Tim Hayward of Edinburgh University and Professor Piers Robinson of the University of Sheffield, promote the work of a fringe group of bloggers and activists who have been accused of spreading false information about the Syrian civil war, which is now in its eighth year.

As part of an ongoing series on propaganda and disinformation in the Syria conflict, HuffPost UK has analysed some of the material published by the academics, including an open letter to the Guardian newspaper. The survey reveals a number of problematic areas and false claims, and illuminates the murky world of online pro-regime activism the academics are promoting.

The ultra conservative One America News Network (OANN), which frequently runs pro-Trump propaganda, claimed in a video report this week that it had found no evidence of an alleged chemical attack on the Syrian town of Douma — the latest in a series of claims by right-wing media and far-right individuals who claim the attack was faked.

THIS MUCH WE KNOW: Someone is lying about the reported use of chlorine gas to kill dozens of Syrian civilians this month in a rebel-held enclave on the outskirts of Damascus.

Either forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria once againcommitted a war crime, by dropping gas cylinders on a residential building in the town of Douma on the final day of a bloody campaign to drive out a terrifying Islamist rebel group; or, as Syria’s ally Russia claims, the volunteer rescue workers who sounded the alarm about the attack staged distressing images of its victims in order to prompt air strikes by the United States, Britain, and France.